ASTRONAUT JOB CAMP AT SAXAVORD SPACEPORT

What does the perfect location for Kid Astronaut training look like?

Walk the craggy, solitary beachfronts of Unst and it is easy to imagine another world entirely. Hike paths that have been naturally worn into the hillsides for hundreds of years and you might as well be picking your way across the craters of the Moon. There are no chain restaurants, no movie theaters, no game rooms. The only public Wi-Fi is at the schools, the library, and the Spaceport itself.

Unst, the northernmost island in the UK, was always going to be the place.

In 2021, Mike Mongo approached SaxaVord Spaceport with a proposal: make it the official home of Astronaut Job Camp, a virtual and in-person Kid Astronaut training program for middle-grade students in the UK, the US, and around the world. SaxaVord said yes immediately.

Today, SaxaVord Spaceport is the first location in the world with a permanent Analog Astronaut training program dedicated to Kid Astronauts. Local students in Shetland have a direct, real connection to astronautics and space careers. And students from around the world have come to Unst, crewed up with their Shetlandic counterparts, and taken a piece of that extraordinary place home with them.

Space, it turns out, keeps proving the same thing: it is local.

Unst was once described as an island of ten thousand sheep and six hundred people. Today it is a launchpad for Kid Astronauts everywhere.